{"id":2112,"date":"2009-03-06T04:58:23","date_gmt":"2009-03-06T09:58:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/?p=2112"},"modified":"2009-03-06T04:58:23","modified_gmt":"2009-03-06T09:58:23","slug":"a-hug-in-a-bowl-faith%e2%80%99s-tunafish-and-noodles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/?p=2112","title":{"rendered":"A Hug in a Bowl: Faith\u2019s Tunafish and Noodles"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"tncweb\"<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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Today I have a guest blogger, my friend Faith Montgomery Paul. As kids Faith and I spent summers together at Singing Brook Farm in Hawley, Massachusetts. She\u2019s probably the first person apart from my family I ever cooked with. We made a ton of fudge and cookies to share with our friends as teenagers! Along the way we cooked up a friendship that has lasted for decades.<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Faith returns to Hawley every summer with her husband Arnold and her son Ian, one of my all-time favorite kids. We only see each other a few days a year, but we\u2019re in touch by e-mail all the time, and it feels as though we\u2019re still just around the corner. She wrote me a few weeks back and said she was in the mood for tuna-noodle casserole, and I said that sounded like a blog post to me! <\/em><\/span><\/div>\n

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When I made the casserole (the photo is of my version; I’m sure Faith’s looks neater!) I didn’t have any canned mushrooms so I saut\u00e9ed a few fresh ones and popped them in. I also threw a little paprika on top because I just love paprika. And I mixed the salt, pepper, and onion granules into the sauce so they would spread out (sorry, Faith; I just can’t help messing with recipes a teensy bit). <\/span><\/em><\/span><\/div>\n

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Anyone else who would like to share thoughts and recipes is very welcome to do so; after all, the name of this blog is \u201cIn OUR Grandmothers\u2019 Kitchens.\u201d<\/em><\/span><\/div>\n

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Meanwhile, here\u2019s Faith\u2026\u2026\u2026\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/div>\n
\"Faith\"<\/em>

Faith<\/p><\/div>\n

Comfort Food<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

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Everyone has his or her own definition of comfort food, and I would be hard put to define it conclusively. But I know it when I eat it. It can take the sting out of winter, or heartbreak, or too much STRESS, at least temporarily. It\u2019s warming and sustaining and non-threatening (no exotic ingredients here!). It\u2019s like eating a hug<\/span> in a bowl.<\/span> Usually, it\u2019s something that my mother Jane made when we were growing up. Sometimes it involves noodles, sometimes cheese <\/span>—<\/span> sometimes both! <\/span><\/p>\n

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Winter is my prime time for comfort food, because I really don\u2019t like winter very much. Yeah, the snow is nice when everything looks impossibly like a postcard. Yeah, it\u2019s great that my son gets to ski (every Tuesday, all day, with hi<\/span>s school — great school —<\/span> but that\u2019s another story). Yeah, I know we only get the other three seasons because we have winter. I get all that. I still don\u2019t like wearing all thes<\/span>e clothes and having my hands<\/span> cold from November to April.<\/span> <\/span>I don\u2019t like days wit<\/span>h more darkness than sunshine. <\/span>Really, I\u2019d just like to eat my weight in chocolate around Thanksgiving (possibly Veterans Day) and then sleep until Memorial Day. <\/span><\/p>\n

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So, along about now, when it seems as if winter might not end, I dig into my memories of childhood and p<\/span>roduce: tunafish and noodles. <\/span>Other people might call it tuna noodle ca<\/span>sserole, but in my family it\u2019s \u201ctunafish and noodles.\u201d<\/span> And here\u2019s how my mother made it.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Ingredients:<\/span><\/div>\n

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about 1\/3 of a 1-pound<\/span> bag of medium-width egg noodles<\/span><\/p>\n

2 cans tuna packed in water<\/span><\/p>\n

2 ribs celery, chopped<\/span> (more<\/span> if you\u2019re a celery fan)<\/span><\/p>\n

1 can mushrooms, optional<\/span><\/p>\n

1 can cream of celery soup<\/span><\/p>\n

1 soup can of milk<\/span><\/p>\n

onion powder (about 1\/4 teaspoon<\/span>, or more to taste)<\/span><\/p>\n

s<\/span>alt and pepper to taste<\/span><\/p>\n

s<\/span>everal slices American cheese<\/span><\/p>\n

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Instructions:<\/span><\/p>\n

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Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cook and drain the noodles according to package directions. While they are cooking, drain the tuna and canned mushrooms (if using) and chop the celery. In a 3-quart casserole, combine the drained tuna, drained mushrooms, and celery, making sure to break up the big chunks of tuna. Add the noodles and mix well. Add the cream of celery soup and milk. Mix very well. Sprinkle with onion powder. Taste for seasoning and add more onion powder and\/or salt and pepper until it is pleasing. Top the casserole with cheese. Bake, covered, for about 45 minutes. If you like the cheese a little brown, remove the cover near the end. Serves 6 to 8.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Note:\u00a0<\/span>My mother always puts butter and salt and pepper on the noodles before she puts them in the casserole, but in a nod to my cholesterol level I don\u2019t. I also use one-percent milk, and we don\u2019t notice the difference. Of course, I do put cheese on top, but you have to draw the line somewhere.<\/span><\/p>\n

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<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 Today I have a guest blogger, my friend Faith Montgomery Paul. As kids Faith and I spent summers together at Singing Brook Farm in Hawley, Massachusetts. She\u2019s probably the first person apart from my family I ever cooked with. We made a ton of fudge and cookies to share with our friends as teenagers! […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[11,15],"tags":[1732,1741,172,228,397],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2112"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2112\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}